I’ve been loving Fritz Leiber short stories recently, after discovering them on the Kindle. This is from “The Seven Black Priests,” the seventh story in the anthology Swords Against Death, in which our heroes are pursued through Nepal and periodically ambushed by seven mysterious priests of a lava god.
—
“The seven black priests-” Fafhrd muttered.
“The six,” the Mouser corrected. “We killed one of them last night.”
“Well, the six then,” Fafhrd conceded. “They seem angry with us.”
“As why shouldn’t they be?” the Mouser demanded. “We stole their idol’s only eye. Such an act annoys priests tremendously.”
“It seemed to have more eyes than that one,” Fafhrd asserted thoughtfully, “if only it had opened them.”
“Thank Aarth it didn’t!” the Mouser hissed. “And ‘ware that dart!”
Fafhrd hid the dirt – or rather the rock – instantly, and the black dart skirred on the ice ahead.
“I think they’re unreasonably angry,” Fafhrd asserted, scrambling to his feet.
“Priests always are,” the Mouser said philosophically.
—
Retyping this now, I notice some blemishes on the prose: Leiber is reluctant to use the verb ‘said’, for example, except in Tom Swifty style (“I love the high jump!” Tom said vaultingly.). Still, write dialogue and situations like that and your readers will be too excited to notice, unless of course they’re trying to retype the story onto their blog.
Enjoy your Friday!